One morning the Student and the Guru were on the Mountain among some boulders, a waterfall and a grassy meadow, having a brunch picnic and a rather pointless dialog. The waterfall tumbled off into a dark and craggy crevasse, the top of which was surrounded by swirling sparkles that formed misty rainbows. There was a point at which there was a pleasant pause, and the Student filled it with something presumably meaningful.
Student: "This taking action business; I can't quite get my consciousness around it. If for example what I want is peace, I don't really have to act, I simply accept the world as it is and am therefore at peace with it."
Guru: "Is accepting not action?"
Student: "True. True. Hm. I don't know…I…oh, thank you." The Guru had just handed her a small cup of some sort of nectar. Perhaps it was fermented? That would be a delight!
They sat in silence for a time, and the Student began to feel a bit out of sorts, her vision shifting, her manual dexterity fading. Colors started to overlap and blend, and then it all collapsed into kaleidoscopic geometry. She heard herself say, "Oh, dear…" as it all went blank.
When she came to she was completely astonished to find that she was dangling from a rope and hanging at least 100 feet below the opening into which the waterfall cascaded, certain that she must be dreaming. She shook her head, attempting to wake from this lucid dream. Wait, it's a lucid dream - I can control it! So she held her arm aloft like some avenging angel attempting to dissolve the rope and fly out of there. It didn't work. She tried to slap herself awake. Wow, if this is a lucid dream I'm in deep!
As the world continued taking recognizable form to her senses, she realized she was in a rough leather harness and the rope trailed away below her and off into the pitch black darkness of the crevasse below. This isn't a dream! If this is a dream I want out now! Please! Now horror set in. Now betrayal. She began shouting for the Guru, wondering if they'd been overtaken by bandits. How does that make sense? Nothing made sense. Absolutely nothing made sense within these conditions. She yelled and yelled until she was hoarse and she no longer had the strength to project her voice.
Then she decided to piece together again what had happened. They were chatting by the waterfall, in the boulders. She was talking about action. The Guru pointed out that acceptance was action…and then…and then he handed her a cup of something. Was that nectar a drug? Did it knock her out? Is the Guru really a sadistic ghoul in disguise? How could such a great and benevolent being be a sadistic ghoul and put me in such a circumstance?
Soon thirst became a need, and she realized if she hung onto the rope and leaned out she could fill her other hand with a little water from the waterfall. Realizing that the day must be wearing on, she tried pulling herself up the rough hemp line, and as she tried wrapping her feet around the rope she became aware for the first time that her shoes were gone, and the rough hemp was very chafing. She steeled herself against that obstacle and realized that she would have to pull herself up 100 feet of this steadily, without stopping, as it would require energy to just remain stationary at each succeeding point higher. Between the sliding, which tore her skin, and the climbing, she realized, exhausted, that she'd managed less than five feet, so she let go the rope and jolted rather sharply back to her fixed position.
Looking down into the black and yawning chasm, into which the rope trailed, fear clutched her chest and she shook her head. "Absolutely not."
Forcing herself to be content for the moment, she waited. She waited for…something, whatever. Yes, she could wait. She waited for the Guru to come. No, no. The Guru couldn't haul her up by himself. So she waited for the Guru to come with help. But what if the Guru is bound and gagged in the boulders? Yeah, yeah, by the bandits. Must've been bandits. Those damned bandits. I hate them. I'll get 'em, you'll see. I'll get those bastards. But wait…if the Guru is bound and gagged, he can't help me. So she had to think of something else to wait for, but, running out of ideas, she couldn't think of anything to wait for. So she waited for inspiration on ideas for just exactly what she could wait for. The Guru will come with help. You'll see. Mm-hm. You'll see. So she waited for the Guru to come with help. All she could do is hope that the Guru would come with...wait, the Guru put me here! How could such a great and benevolent being put me in such a circumstance?
Am I having a déjà vu? She shrugged.
I'll give it ten more minutes, she thought, and then I'll…what? Looking down into the ever-darkening chasm fear again seized her from stem to stern, and she shook her head. "Absolutely not."
After what must have been another hour, she realized there was no feeling in her legs, the circulation down to a trickle. She knew she couldn't hang there for even another half-hour, much less the entire night. In despair, she began to cry, railing at the circumstances, at the Guru, at the waterfall and spray for making her cold and wet, at her legs for going numb, at her feet for not having shoes on them, at the rope for being rough and devoid of knots on which she could get hold, at the rocks for being hard and black, at the opening for being 100 feet above, at the trees she could see above the opening for laughing at her with their annoying little flickering leaves glittering in the wind! Soon, she ran out of things she could complain about.
As she slumped forward against the taut hemp line, thinking she might sleep, she felt a pressure in her thigh. Leaning back, she saw that she had a knife and scabbard tucked into her belt. Where the hell did that come from? This was simply all too insane. What is this? She took the knife out and logically thought, there is only one thing this could be for! And so she raised it, set it against the hemp line, and gently pressed, but not too hard. One little fiber, then two, were cut.
Is this a test? she wondered. Is this like some radical Guru lesson on trust? Just cut the line and trust? Trust that the Master, the Guru, knows what he's doing, that he'll swoop in on a cloud of levitation and whisk me out through the top? Trust exactly what? My faith? Do I trust my faith? Trust my faith? Are you kidding? I don't even know what that means...trust my faith...huh! Aren't they the same thing? That's a question for the Guru, if I ever see him again, the rotten bastard.
Wait, I know right now I can't do what everybody else does, make an uninformed choice and blindly hope for the best. Yep! Here we go! I give it fifty/fifty that it's a test! If it's not, well…then I become a shredded mess on the rocks. That isn't what this is about. By the way, what is this about? She chuckled insanely to herself, laughing and crying at the same time. Would somebody care to tell me what this is about? "Oh, God, what the hell am I doing here?" She began to laugh harder, and harder, cackling like a madwoman, her laughter echoing around the cavern and blending with the waterfall, which actually sounded precisely like a applause at the moment.
She laughed until her gut hurt. "Oh, holy Toledo…that's funny. That's so funny!" And she laughed some more. Soon she forgot what she was laughing about, which was even funnier.
Still laughing, she thought, So, my options: (a) I wind up a shredded mess on the rocks, (b) the Guru swoops in and saves me, (c) I lower myself, in intense fear I might add.
Thinking a few rather incongruous thoughts, they ran as follows. Why am I here? I don't know. But maybe the more important question is why is the rope here? What if the rope just runs out? Then I'm stranded in the dark at the end of this rough, miserable, unforgiving rope! But then I have the knife. O.K., so, if the rope runs out, I use the knife. It doesn't matter. With certainty, she nodded to herself, saying, "This is all an illusion anyway." Oh yeah? the devil inside mocked. If it's an illusion, then why are you afraid? "Good question," she said aloud. "Damned good question, actually. But right now I don't give a damn about why I'm afraid. Even if I don't know why I'm here, I know why this rope is here and this cold, wet, miserable waterfall has to go somewhere and I'm going to find that out dead or alive."
Inspecting the configuration of the rope and cleats, she had simply to unwind the rope from the bottom one and feed it through the top one. Ouch! Her hands were getting friction burns. Screw the pain! she thought. Pain doesn't matter. What does pain matter? And wait till I get my hands on those damned bandits. They're going to be sorry they ever messed with this chick! The devil inside said, Come on, do you really believe there are bandits? "There has to be some explanation," she said aloud. Down she went, little by little, then a little faster, terrified out of her mind and still laughing away and talking to herself.
Now she was in pitch black and stopped, afraid that she couldn't so much as see the rope eight inches from her face. "Screw the fear!" she said aloud. Fear doesn't matter. Why would fear matter? Who cares about fear?
Hm, what if the rope just keeps going and going, never ending? Then what? I just stay in the dark, feeding rope and dropping until I starve, I suppose. No, I wouldn't starve; I'd just cut the line. But when would I make my mind up about that? Hm. Good question. It's all an illusion anyway. The devil inside chimed in, If it's just an illusion, then why are you...
"Shut-up," she said, "I'm still working through that one." Well, better move, better than just sitting here now isn't it. Hm. Rope never ending - it certainly wouldn't be any stranger than this entire experience. "This is easy," she said aloud, starting to feel pride and fear at the same time. Yes, it's very easy. Wow, it's dark. Down and down. Hm. A lot of rope. Must be a thousand feet of it. Where did those bandits get all that rope? Can't see a damned thing. Oops, there we are. Hm. Fancy that. Solid ground. Ho! My feet hurt! Careful, rock's slick with the spray from that blasted waterfall.
She heard someone call her name, faintly, from somewhere nearby but on the other side of the rock wall. Now she could make out that there was some light coming in and crossing her feet. Her name was called again. She felt her way around the wet and pitch black rock to her left and saw more light. Getting down on all fours, she thought, No problem at all. This was easy - no reason to fuss at all. Crawling to the light, she got lower and shimmied through the opening, and blinded by the light she slumped to the ground. As soon as her eyes adjusted to the brilliant afternoon sun, the Guru's sandals came into focus. "Well," she said, filled with bravado, "that was easy! What's next?"
The Guru's voice came from within a blinding light: "What did you learn?"
Student: "Learn? Learn, you bastard?! I learned that I'll never take a cup of nectar from you again!"
The Guru laughed heartily: "Come come. What did you learn?"
Student: "I learned that it's pointless to wait.
"I learned that the opposite of waiting is making decisions and committing to them and acting upon them, right or wrong. You can't make a decision and not have an attendant action, because that is also waiting.
"I learned that fear is the only thing to be feared, and pain just hurts and nothing more.
"I learned that you can't argue with what is, so accept it. Isness doesn't listen to argument.
"I learned that when there is only one choice, it's not a choice at all, but a decision that has to be made and to therefore be at peace with it, and to accept it too."
"Ah!" shouted the Guru with great joy, "then on your feet, girl, for you have also learned that there is no free will! Isn't it wonderful? Congratulations! Come. Come come come. We have a great deal to do today!"


CHAPTER 4

The Student and the Guru were sitting together, surfing the Web, looking for Websites where Truth could be found. The Student felt a question coming on, and so she asked it.
Student: "You said some time ago that I have to learn to let go of my definitions of myself. What do you mean by that?"
Guru: "Imagine yourself as a balloon. Is there any reason to believe that the air inside the balloon is more you than the air outside the balloon?"
Student: "No. So the membrane of the balloon is just a very thin border marking the line between the finite and the infinite."
Guru: "In a manner of speaking, yes. Let me ask you a question. Does IT, the Eternal, have form?
Student: "If you mean apart from us, then no."
Guru: "Since it has no form, could it have size?"
Student: "No."
Guru: "Since it has no size, could it have boundaries?
Student: "No."
Guru: "I'll borrow from an ancient Zen text. Because it has no boundaries, it has no inside or outside. Having no inside or outside, it has no far or near. With no far or near, there is no there or here. Since there is no there or here, there is no going or coming. Because there is no going or coming, there is no birth or death. Having no birth or death, it has no past or present. With no past or present, there is no delusion or enlightenment. There being no delusion or enlightenment, there is no ordinary or holy. Since there is nothing ordinary or holy, there is no pollution or purity. Because there is no pollution or purity, there is no judgment of right and wrong. With no judgment of right and wrong, all terms and statements are ungraspable. Once there are no such subjective states and false ideas, then all sorts of appearances and all sorts of labels are utterly meaningless. Is this not you devoid of definitions?"
Student: "I see your point. But isn't that the nothingness void, Bliss, Nirvana whatever the hell you want to call it...I mean, what would be the point in creating?"
Guru: "The inverse is purposelessness, and remember that which has no purpose has no existence. Let me ask you another question. Does time exist?"
Student: "No. It's just another falsely perceived definition of limitation."
Guru: "If time doesn't exist, then sequence also does not exist, correct?"
Student: "I should think so, yes."
Guru: "If a thing is conceivable, is it also inevitable?"
Student: "Based on this line of thinking, yes."
Guru: "Well, it's not, because inevitability also implies that it hasn't become an event yet, which in itself also implies sequence, or time. So, based on this, all possible things already exist, always have, always will, and this is the state of all potential, what some Philosophers called Potentia. Do you think Potentia is localized anywhere?"
Student: "I don't know how it could be, if there is no inside our outside, no far nor near. So what you're saying is that Potentia is what is both inside and outside the balloon. That all potential is both inside and outside the balloon? And I'm the balloon? And the balloon membrane is my self-imposed perception of definition?"
Guru: "Could it be any other way?"
The Student puzzled about that for a moment. Then she said, "No, I don't see how it could be."
Guru: "So let's take it a step further." She took the mouse in hand and started moving it around on the pad, and the cursor arrow was following the instructions and making circles and loops on the screen. "On the computer screen when you move the mouse around, and you see the cursor, the little arrow, sweeping around on the screen, leaving little tracers behind it…"
Student: "O.K."
Guru: "Did you know that the motion is an illusion?"
Student: "An illusion?"
Guru: "Yes. What's really happening is that the computer is completely redrawing what is seen on the screen for every succeeding position of the cursor. So that all you are seeing is the entire screen redrawn, or refreshed, as a single frame, each succeeding frame with the cursor in a very slightly different position. It works just like film. You're not seeing motion; you're seeing a series of still frames strung together, so the illusion is motion while the frames by themselves are reality, taken from Potentia based upon your choices. Because each of those frames are autonomous, standalone events, they are also each simply Now events strung together."
Student: "Wow, I see what you're saying and why you're saying it, because motion also implies distance, or space, and space must also imply here or there, and if there is here or there, there is also point-to-point travel, which is the only way time could be, like Einstein came up with, the 'time-space continuum.' If there is no distance, or space, there is no time, and therefore all there could be are succeeding Nows with the subject, in this case the cursor arrow, in a different position. But in the Eternal, if there are no forms, there can be no space. Time can only exist in an environment with space and forms."
Guru: "Exactly. The question is this: does the entire computer screen reconfigure, even reformulate itself to accommodate each next, or each Now position of the cursor arrow?"
Student: "It has to. Each one is a whole new screen."
Guru: "And all the colors and forms on the screen are combinations and sequences of ones and zeros, and because it requires so many ones and zeros, so much digital data, do you wonder how it can refresh the screen so quickly, such that the eye can't detect the reproduction of the individual frames?"
Student: "That had crossed my mind."
Guru: "The vast majority of the data is embedded, which is to say that it's remembered. Because it's remembered, it doesn't need to recreate itself from scratch. All the computer must do is take all the remembered data, project it onto the screen, and then add only the necessary data to fill in the space the cursor occupied in the previous frame with color and form and project the next frame with the form of the cursor in a new position. The only data that has changed is the little fill-in in the previous frame where the cursor was, and of course the little white arrow in the subsequent frame. That's all that's changed because the vast majority of the data is remembered. You could say that…"
Student: "I know where you're going with this. That if we were unable to remember what the world looks like from one second to the next there wouldn't be a world, because WE carry that embedded and agreed upon data."
The Guru's eyebrows arose, causing lines to form on her forehead: "We carry it?"
The Student laughed dryly. "Sorry," she said, "we are the data, and every movement we make is not movement, but a new frame which contains us in a new position, and the Universe has literally redrawn, or refreshed, a modified version of itself to accommodate our new position."
Guru: "Might it be safer to say that you have refreshed yourself to accommodate your new position?"
Student: "Oh, dear God, if I AM everything then that is absolutely true!"
Guru: "If we didn't remember the data of this world…or instead of putting it that way, let's say that we purged all of that remembered data, what world would we be in?"
The Student shrugged. "One without embedded definitions. One of pure spontaneous creativity, like nonstop play. Now I can see why a Great Ascended Master can't simply wave a wand and change everything in this world overnight. All of us here...we're all the data, refreshing the Universe continuously, each of us acting, sometimes with those actions in harmony but far more with those actions in disharmony, almost like canceling each other out. The disharmonious actions and thoughts are what are holding all this in form. That way we're holding the forms in form, and it's all due to habitual thinking, conditioned response, which is embedded data."
Guru: "How can you be so arrogant?"
The Student was suddenly in despair. "No, please, please don't go there."
Guru: "I'm kidding."


CHAPTER 5

CHARACTERS
Attum: Female Student
Neve: Male Student
Pat: Guru

Attum 'n' Neve, esteemed students of the LightOn Awaken Thyself Academy (LATA, Ultd.), were sitting alone together talking about graduation from the IN (IsNess) level of training. They were strolling the Mountain trail on the way to meet the Guru at the archery range. The topics were light, and they were laughing, but soon they started into their experiences.
Attum exclaimed: "What about that cavern dangling! Huh? What about that! Was that wild or what? What if I'd have just cut the line? Did you think about that?"
Neve: "Which question did you want me to answer?" he sarcastically asked.
She pushed him and he nearly fell to his death off a sheer cliff. She was fed up with smug Guru types. He pulled himself hand-over-hand on a tiny vine back up to the trail, and said, "What cavern? I didn't get to go into a cavern."
Attum: "Get to go? It was a nightmare!" And then she told him all about it, how the devil kept yacking at her and how pissed off she was at everything, and that it all turned out to be so easy anyway. Oh, and that she cut her hand right...here. See it? It's her badge of honor.
Neve: "Hm. Sounds fun to me. Why didn't I get to do it?"
Attum: "I guess you didn't need the experience."
Neve: "And you did?"
Attum: "Absolutely. It changed everything for me. Terror, pain, the whole bit, anger, complaining to...to what, like anybody will ever truly listen to that, futility, madness, listening to the devil and knowing he's right! Do you know how it makes you feel when everybody tells you this is all an illusion, I believe them, and yet I still fear it? How sick is that? It was like a lifetime compressed into five hours."
Neve: "Wow. Cool. Maybe I'll get to do it tomorrow."
Attum: "No, dummy, don't you get it? You won't get to because you don't need to. Here at the LightOn Awaken Thyself Academy you only experience what you need to experience in order to get IT."
Neve: "Never saw it that way. You're probably right."
She looked at him like, Is he all here? Helloooo.
Neve: "I still don't get the free will thing, do you? Why did the Guru say there is no free will? I thought free will was this foundational God-given birthright here, like it's not even available as an option in other universes or something."
Attum: "That one's easy. There is free will, silly, but only to make the wrong choice. Free will isn't necessary otherwise."
Neve: "What? Explain."
Attum: "Well, take my cavern adventure. I had two choices: cut the line or follow the rope down. I had the free will to cut the line, which was the 'wrong choice.' But since cutting the line was out of the question, there was really no choice, and therefore no use for free will. I simply made the decision to go the only way possible, to accept it and to be at peace with it. It's about decisions more than it's about choices, and being at peace with those decisions."
Neve: "Oh wow. That's cool. If you superimpose that onto other circumstances, I wonder if it holds water."
Attum: "Sure. Look at it in the broadest sense. You are either on a trajectory of perfection that has its own momentum and course or you are using free will to go careening carelessly (but certainly passionately) off that path, take the wrong exit off the freeway in North Dakota when you're on your way to L.A., so to speak."
Neve: "That ties-in in a wild way with the screen and cursor thing."
Attum: "Come again? What was that about?"
Neve: "You didn't get that lesson? Well, then," he said, clearing his throat for effect, "let me explain." He rolled it all out, explained everything, how the vast majority of the data is embedded, how the screen refreshes itself to accommodate the next position of the cursor and that the cursor itself doesn't move at all, but simply blinks back into existence in a different position, how the ones and zeros are just another way of saying Potentia, and that Potentia has no size, form, boundaries, and that we're the balloon and the air inside and out, the whole bit.
Attum: "Wow," she said, staring at the wind-glittering leaves, marveling that she had so despised them just a few days ago while hanging below them in the waterfall cavern. "That explains in left-brain terms what I've always known. That everything is connected. I wonder why I didn't get that lesson?"
He looked her like, Is she all here? Helloooo.
She became reflective about it, saying, "Those leaves...the Universe completely reconfigures itself in a refreshed new way to accommodate each new position of those glittering leaves. They blink out of existence in one place and back into existence in another place, even if it's just a fraction of a millimeter. Everything is so connected that the reconfiguration of the entire equation is never not happening - the leaves affect me and I affect them because they occupy the same refreshed space I do. Never stops. And everything we say, think or do is reflected in that reformulation and reconfiguration. Just waving my hand has at least a tiny effect on Jupiter."
Neve: "Yes," he said, equally reflective. "It ties-in to the chaos question: If a butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazon does it start a chain reaction through the ones and zeros that builds its own momentum and results in a hurricane in Miami? If so, and it's certainly not inconceivable, then the butterfly better damned well be careful as to how it flaps its wings."
Attum: "Wow." She stopped, sat on a rock and said a prayer, apologizing to everything and everyone for being so angry and yelling at them a few days ago.
Neve: "That's beautiful."
They walked on.
Attum: "But wait a minute. If there is no size or boundaries, no there or here, and therefore no space to traverse and therefore no motion, why would the word 'position' apply?"
Neve: "Good question, and I've been wrestling with it myself. Let's say that you are alone in all the Universe, the only object in it, do you have a position?"
Attum: "No, because my position can only be determined in relation to something else."
Neve: "Exactly, which is one of the things Einstein was saying in 'Relativity.' Now look at the cursor arrow. We know that the screen refreshes itself with a completely fresh and new frame to depict the now updated location of the cursor arrow. But the screen, like our world as we perceive it, is a finite environment, correct? So, what if what is really happening is that you're moving the mouse around, the cursor is actually staying absolutely stationary, and the entire environment is moving around, the stuff on the screen, the monitor itself, you, your chair, your walls and floor. Everything moves but the cursor arrow itself."
Attum: "No way. You mean it's possible that we don't move at all, but the world we perceive somehow depicts motion, which is itself not even happening? Like a movie? James Dean is screaming along in his Spider but all that is happening is that his car is stationary on a soundstage and the landscape, buildings, cars, are the only things moving?"
Neve: "Yeah, like that, but are they in fact moving? Or is motion the illusion? The Roadrunner, the cartoon - he's zipping along the desert floor in Arizona. He stays in the middle of your screen, but dunes, rocks, bluffs, cactus - they all zip past him. Did you get to mess around in the virtual reality dome?"
Attum: "No. I guess I go in there tomorrow."
Neve: "Well, you're standing on a treadmill, gloves on your hands, sensors on your legs, goggles, earphones, the whole bit, and you're interacting with an environment that responds to your actions, which is more accurately said, responds to your input and computes a newly updated world for you to interact with and does it so quickly you don't see that it's a series of flashes. You blink out in one spot and blink back in in the next spot. If you walk, the treadmill moves under your feet to complete the illusion, and objects beside you pass you, not you them."
Attum: "No way. It can't possibly be that way! Can it?"
Neve: "Why not? One thing Einstein proved is that the speed of Light is constant, but his 'Theory of Relativity' states that something has to be relative, so it's space and objects that are relative. It's not that the faster you go means you're able to traverse more space in less time, it means that the faster you go the less space there is to traverse, until you hit Light Speed, where there is no space at all, and you can't hit Light speed unless you're Light. Space has contracted to the point where the Light is absolutely motionless. Well, guess what? We're Light. And it's not that the environment is actually passing you, every single particle of it is blinking out in one place relative to your perception and blinking back in in another place relative to your perception."
Attum: "I gotta sit down for a second. That's heavy stuff. But you know what's wild? That also ties-in with free will."
Neve also took a seat on a rock. "How do you mean?"
Attum: "Well, like you said before if Time doesn't exist, then all possible things and conditions, even thoughts, already exist, always have and always will. So let's say that you develop cancer, and we call it the problem. Well, the Universe has always known that you would develop cancer, your cancer has always existed, and therefore the Universe has always known the precise, exact solution, which also always existed, and the Now-point at which the solution is called forth to resolve the problem. Is it really resolving the problem? Because if the precise solution and the Now-point at which it is realized have always been known, what is the purpose of free will? Is it resolving the problem? No, you're simply purging the embedded data that documents that there was ever a problem to begin with, and the solution simply becomes. Have you ever heard of that case history of that woman with both well-documented diabetes and multiple personality syndrome?"
Neve: "Don't think so."
Attum: "When her second personality emerges, they take blood and there is no diabetes at all. Her second personality does not have diabetes. So it's..."
Neve: "Her second personality has no embedded data, no memory of the condition. It's all in her first personality's head. All of it, no part of this is not in your head, including the virtual reality environment that you think is passing you when you walk. It's all perception. Even when we're walking, our perception that we're traversing space is also just a perception in our heads! If we didn't have a hearing mechanism to pick up silent waves which are then interpreted by the brain into an agreed upon what we call 'sound,' there would be no sound, only the silent waves. Our senses feed data to an interpreting mechanism, our brain, and that interpreting mechanism is pre-programmed to report to us what that stream of data represents."
Attum: "Is the solution really resolving the problem, replacing it, so to speak?"
Neve: "Wow. You're right. The cancer itself can only exist because I exercised free will to contract it. Therefore, the solution is...the perfection that was always there and we were choosing, by free will, to not see it, and seeing is the only thing that counts. All anybody has done is exercised free will to experience imperfection, but if you live perfection free will is not needed. It brings a whole new meaning to the phrase, 'What you see is what you get'."
Attum: "And remember, the virtual reality environment that you're causing to respond to your thoughts, words, actions is interacted with by everyone else, and so they are of course affected by all your choices, and you by their choices. They're also causing a computation that produces a world according to their perceptions, and we all redraw the screen that contains our fears, hatred, all if it, in this unbelievably dynamic virtual reality."
Neve abruptly stood up. "And check this out. Putting your attention on the word 'solution' also implies that there is a problem, which means that your attention also sees a problem, and your attention is what gives the problem life to begin with. There aren't two things, problem and solution, there is only One True Thing. So, you have to KNOW that what we're calling the solution is the only thing that exists, and we can't even look at it as a solution so much as that which always was, is and always will be, the Perfection that was always there."
Attum: "But the so-called problem is embedded data in the whole system, right?"
Neve: "Yes, but if you keep your attention on Perfection, the embedded data becomes raw, unstructured data and simply returns to...well...Source."
Attum: "Thus, free will exists only in virtual reality. Free will and Perfection are mutually exclusive concepts."
Neve was excited, walking to and fro: "And get this. That also ties-in with the Guru hammering away on me about..."
Attum: "What do you want?"
Neve: "Exactly! Did the Guru hammer away on you too?"
Attum: "I wanted to scream, I was so frustrated."
Neve: "Do you see? In other words, if you want to change something, it must be a problem, which means your attention is also on that which you want to change, which means that you're feeding the problem. Change also ecompasses the word solution, and we know that if there is a solution then we must also give our attention to a problem. The only reason that the problem exists is because people want to change it, or they're plain addicted to the problem. Not even the solution is Perfection, Perfection is One, while the problem and solution are two."
Attum was nodding thouhtfully. "Wow. That is profound, and yet so simple."
Neve: "The Guru said to me: 'It is nothing if it..."
Attum: "...is not that. Me too."
They were looking at each other, nodding and smiling a little as though they were now holders of Great Secrets.
"And now, Children," chimed in the Guru joyfully, standing esoterically amongst the trees, "you have solved a couple of the great quandaries of quantum physics! Come."
They followed, Attum whispering to Neve, "Where did the Guru come from?"
Neve: "No idea."



CHAPTER 6

The three of them reconvened at LATA's archery range. The Guru seemed particularly pleased today. "Get your bows and arrows and meet me back here."
As soon as they were ready, the Guru said: "So, shoot at the target."
They both nocked arrows and fired away. Not bad. They both hit the target, Attum's a little closer to the bullseye.
Guru: "Ah, excellent. Now let's try this," handing them blindfolds. "Put them on, twirl in place twice, and then fire at the target."
They did so, missing badly. The Guru stepped aside so Neve's arrow would pass on by and lodge itself in the wall of the equipment shed, and Attum's simply vanished somewhere in the forest.
Guru: "How could you have missed the target so badly?"
Attum: "Because we can't see it."
Guru: "So, you have to be able to see it in order for it to be, is that it?"
They both lifted their blindfolds and smiled at him.
Guru: "Let's talk a little about quantum theory. I'll make it simple and not bore you. It's talked about all the time these days. Nobody truly understands it because to understand it is to measure it, quantify it, and by those findings explain it, none of which can be done. One of the basic tenets of it is that you can't measure both the position and momentum of a given particle simultaneously, and it's only objects at the atomic and subatomic level that have this problem. What I mean by that is that you can measure a planet or a passing car, take a snapshot of its position, a few seconds later take another snapshot, compare the two, and know what the large object's position was at a fixed moment and its momentum simulatenously, and momentum is speed, trajectory, path, etc.
"Another of the many problems, which is what we most want to cover today, is quantum entanglement, which has mystified theoretical physicists since the beginning. Quantum theory tells you that everything is in a 'superposed' state when not being observed. 'Superposed' mean's superpositions, or all positions. It's everywhere when you're not looking at it, and in one place when you are. Imagine that. The two of you were talking about that very thing. It's all just ones and zeros until your senses pick up those ones and zeros and the brain then interprets those ones and zeros into pre-preprogrammed embedded agreements of forms and sounds. So, to hammer the point home, you can say that beyond any argument whatsoever is that this tree, that bow, the Moon, and on and on, exist only as ones and zeros without you to observe them into being and use the embedded software in your head to make them appear to be real.
"Quantum entanglement is this. In the lab they entangle two particles by causing them to exist in the same state; particle A and particle B now are like clones, let's say. Now, they separate those particles by any distance, it doesn't matter how far, an inch or across a galaxy, and then modify particle A some way or another and then particle B is simultaneously modified, which basically breaks the speed-of-light law. What can travel faster than Light? Nothing, they say, and yet quantum entanglement proves that information can cross the observable Universe in exactly no time at all. But it's important to know that the modification to B isn't the same modification, but a complementary one. What is the answer to this mystery?"
Attum: "That's simple. There is no particle B. There is only particle A, and what the lab guy thinks is B is really A, and so, in fact, is the lab guy. In Potentia, everything is the same thing. It's perfectly symmetrical and homogeneous."
Neve: "Yeah, it's like this. If you were to divide yourself into a million and one versions of yourself, and you pricked number 137 with a pin, is there any reason to believe that the other one million versions of you wouldn't feel the pain at the exact same moment?"
Guru: "Applause to you, young man, because you've just explained complementarity."
Attum: "How's that?"
Guru: "If both particles are A, twins, and you modify one and the other is instantly modified, but not in the same way, only a complementary, or even cooperative, way, what then do you have?"
Neve: "Cause equals pinprick, effect equals pain. The one version of me is the cause, the other million versions of me are the complementary response. We're both the cause and the effect, and our causes effect every part of the whole. That's what the theoretical physicists are missing, that they themselves are also entangled, seeing only the effect they expect to see, thus causing it."
Guru: "How many versions of you are there?"
Attum: "All of them. There isn't anything that isn't just a version of the One Thing."
Guru: "And how is the quantum theory solved? That you can't measure both the position and momentum at the same time?"
Neve: "Because there is no motion at all, and therefore no momentum to measure. There are only particles which kindly position themselves where I expect them to be. They haven't moved, they simply came into being in those positions as a complementary, or cooperative, reaction to my action."
Attum: "There is no re-action. There is only cooperative action."
Neve: "Good point."
And so it went, back and forth between Attum 'n' Neve, each smacking the learning ball forth and back.
Guru: "So, don't mean to interrupt, but what does this mean?"
Attum: "It means that if cause and effect are simultaneous, and I AM both, then there is only one reason for being, and that is to create, because to create is the only thing that qualifies as both cause and effect."
Guru: "Exacting way to put it. Creation, the act of creating, is the only thing that is both cause and effect, and so for efficiency you simply dispense with the concepts cause and effect. Beautiful."
Neve: "And also, to bring that which you desire into being is simply the act of being everything but now with the screen refreshed to include the desired thing. You have to BE what you want in your world, a little like Ghandi said. Or like the little Yogi kid in The Matrix, 'There is no spoon, only you...'"
Guru: "O.K., then manifest something for me."
Neve: "I...can't."
Guru: "Based on your explanation just now, you most certainly can."
Neve tried, thinking that he was on the cusp of a big breakthrough. Nothing happened, although when a cloud passed over the sun he became excited for a moment. That has to mean something, he thought.
Guru: "Why can't you?"
Attum: "Because he has embedded data that tells him he can't, and he believes it."
Guru: "Right. And what generic name does that embedded data take?"
Neve: "Doubt."
Guru: "So what's the answer?"
Neve: "To purge the embedded data, or rise above its influence - all beliefs, opinions, judgements, and on and on, and start seeing what others don't see. If you see it, you're stuck in it, or to it, or whatever, but if you see it, you're entangled with it. So you have to choose something different to see."
Guru: "Rise is precisely the word I was looking for. And what is the outcome?"
Attum: "The purging of all perception of limitation, thus becoming unlimited."
Neve: "All of this implies computation, doesn't it?"
Nodding with a small smile, eyes ablaze, the Guru quietly said, "Yes."
Attum: "And if it involves computation, you could say that we're the ones sitting at the keyboard, authoring all this, but it's like we're authoring it on some level that only novices get to play with. We lack the password..."
Neve: "...the code, actually."
Attum: "Yes, yes that's what I meant, the code, something that gets you, or admits you, into a deeper level of the causal machine, so to speak."
They both looked at the Guru, their expressions depicting...Well?
Two bright birds, small and chirping madly, one blue and the other yellow, fluttered down from the treetops and each positioned itself on one of the Guru's shoulders. "Now let's apply what you've learned. Here, take these cups and drink."
Neve: "Now wait a minute. What about...we asked you...what's with those birds? Wait...where...?"
"Birds?" the Guru asked with genuine astonishment. "What birds? Now, enough of this foolishness. Drink this."
Attum was still blinking in confusion about the birds - there, not there - but the sudden appearance of an unlabeled liquid awakened a conditioned response in her: "Are you out of your mind? Never!"
Laughing with such delight, the Guru said, "It's nothing like the other stuff."
"Cheers," they said in unison, tapping the cups and downing the contents, having no memory of the...
Attum braced for her inevitable black out, but it didn't come. She felt a little thrilling feeling, but that was about it. Quite pleasant, actually.
Guru: "Now, shoot at the target."
They each nocked arrows and let fly. Good shots, this time Neve's being a little closer to the bullseye.
Guru: "Now lower your blindfolds."
They each did so. "Oh, woooowww," said Neve. "That's cool." Attum simply lifted her blindfold up, just to see what things looked like again, clearly astonished. They were seeing that the one target on the one tree was somehow everywhere, and not in any linear way. It was everywhere, up, down, side to side, almost kaleidoscopically overlapping and somehow stacked but you could see perfectly the ones "behind," somewhat like looking into opposing mirrors and seeing the reflected and ever-shrinking versions trail off into infinity, but with a few thousand opposing mirrors. And the view didn't change as they moved their heads, only that there seemed to be a focal point around which the zillions of targets "moved."
Guru: "Shoot."
They each nocked arrows and let fly - both arrows thunked into the target's bullseye simultaneously, the arrows actually touching. They were both smiling, knowing beyond any doubt, knowing without even lifting their blindfolds that they had both nailed the bullseye, seeing a zillion arrows stuck in a zillion bullseyes.
Neve: "Now that is what I call cool."
Guru: "So, what do you want?"
Neither lifted their blindfolds.
Attum: "It's so simple. What else is there? To create abundance and joy and share it with everyone who is willing to accept it."
Guru: "Neve?"
Neve: "Can't put it better than that."
Guru: "Is that or is that not exactly what God does?"
Attum: "God is as God does."
They were smilingly silent, blindfolds in place.
Guru: "How do you plan to go about creating it?"
Attum: "I don't know, but I do know that standing around here yacking at you two isn't getting it done." She yanked off the blindfold and walked towards the shed, saying over her shoulder, "I love you guys."
Neve lifted his blindfold and looked at the Guru, his eyes a little misty. "Thank you," he said, and headed towards the shed.